Preschool Parenting Culture

I stick out a lot here because I have four kids, but I was expecting that. Two is the average here. I get a lot of “are they twins?” about the younger ones as apparently it would be odd for us to intentionally have four children, or comments like v“how do you do it?” (still don’t have a great reply for that one).

But I stick out in another way I hadn’t anticipated: people are always surprised when they hear that I keep the younger two at home. I get asked regularly where they go to preschool, and incredulous looks follow when I say that they don’t.

Apparently it is rare for children to remain at home for their earlier years here, probably due to a few factors—both parents having to work to afford living here, or there being more highly-educated people likely to elect focusing on their careers.

But third, and this is the part I’ve been pondering, I get the sense people here place a higher value on early-child development: they have such a high standard that they feel the only way to do it well is to outsource it to the professional experts. There is a lot of talk about education strategies and things like SEL’s (socio-emotional learning), Carol Dweck growth mindsets, optimizing your child’s brain development and exposures by a certain age. Combine that with a resource-rich environment and parents who either naturally want the best for their kids or are the “Stanford-or-bust” types, and you get competitive preschools teaching based on the latest Stanford experiments, preschools touting specific play-oriented environments, and lessons for little ones ranging from the typical (music, multiple languages, sports, ceramics) to the unusual (Legos to teach political skills, metal-working).

It’s easy to ask, how can I possibly be doing all that by myself at home? Maybe some people are wondering, why would I want to? Why not go do what I trained for twelve years to do, or go get some self-care, and leave that to the experts?

I am in no way judging kids who do go to preschool (we’ll probably find one for the three year-old next year) or lessons, but part of adjusting to being here has been processing this sort of tension. It’s made me realize that I do personally believe in and desire to teach them myself, in large part because the most important things—world view, values, priorities, principles—are taught implicitly, as they are lived out, and I want my kids to see that from me. Maybe I’m just too sanguine and laid-back to worry overmuch about what they are missing, though in that case it’s good to be challenged about what and how I teach them at home.

And that’s the bottom line about living here: there are so many things that are good, but I’m constantly having to decide when there’s too much of a good thing, or whether that good thing in fact aligns with the gospel and our purpose. Without that lens, it’s so easy to get sucked into a certain way of feeling and operating, because the culture here is so strong: its values are like a riptide that can pull you under unawares. We thought a lot of that through before making this move, but it’s interesting to see how it plays out in ways we do or don’t expect.

California

Well, we have moved to California, nearly two months ago, and I think I’m ready to write about it. To the two people who still check this blog.

This was not a shotgun move. It was several years in the making, and made intentionally for mission and community, which I’m realizing is very strange in Silicon Valley. People come here for tech, for Stanford, or for the academic success of their kids. Where we live, houses cost anywhere from two to ten million dollars: it’s this strange oxymoron, seeing dated, small houses that would go for 100K anywhere else in the country, but that cost millions because of the dirt they sit on.

This place is full of contradictions like that. Inclusivity, awareness, and diversity, for example, are huge values, but while people are diverse in terms of ethnicity or lifestyle, there isn’t much diversity socio-politically or economically.

That’s led to a sense of personal dissonance, because while I fit in perfectly on the surface—I’m a highly-educated, slim, casually-dressed Asian female, which every other woman seems to be here—I’m actually really different inwardly. I have way more kids than anyone else here probably thinks is responsible (or affordable), and I primarily parent them myself rather than outsourcing for the sake of career or self-care. Our kids go to a choice school that they pretty much accidentally (providentially) got in to, not because I had orchestrated or worried about it. Similarly, we live in a covetable house, but due to an act of grace, not by merit or striving. Our kids do have some enrichment skills like language or music, but because I try to teach them myself at home, not because they were enrolled in a ton of extracurriculars from a young age. I secretly compost and recycle not for the good of the earth, but because our regular trash can is sized for a midget. I have ties to an Ivy League, but I’m an under-achiever in my career. I value kindness and inclusivity, but I believe in absolute truth.

When we first moved here, there was just so much to thrill the heart, and I was just soaking all that in, rightfully so—our kids are around other kids that look like them! The weather is disgustingly perfect, all the time! There are (almost) no mosquitos! The food—the food! The parks and playgrounds and zoos and museums and things to do with the kids! Perhaps I will never get over seeing an orange tree outside the window, opening the windows to a fresh cool breeze at night, or seeing blue mountains in the distance. I’m still amazed by the 100-book checkout limit at the library, the way our kids have taken to biking everywhere, and how any retail store in the universe appears to be within ten minutes of our house.

But eventually things about the culture started to soak in. Part of me feels lonely, and I’m not even sure what for—I don’t think Virginia was a place we could have stayed forever, or that I really belonged in either—perhaps what I miss are people who unconditionally love and support us; people I felt I could completely be myself around. And I know that only comes with time. Part of me is trying to make myself relevant to the culture here, while figuring out how to be intentional about who I still am. A few days ago, after realizing I was getting a bit swept away by school stuff, we finally got back on some spiritual and marriage routines we had lost with the move, and that was good.

So there are a few unique things about this time period: it’s going to be lonely. It takes a while for a place to feel like home (someone told me eighteen months) and that’s okay. The loneliness hits me at random times, like when I think of something a friend back in Virginia would have liked to know about, or when I get lost again going somewhere. And this is also a formative time: we have a new chance to define ourselves, to set the right foundation, and part of that is intentionally not getting swept away by various pressures, is being willing to wait and discern before making decisions about our commitments.

And a lot of it is drawing closer to God, as to an anchor in changing seas or a resting place in lonely times. This move throws into clearer relief that we all long for home, a place where we belong, where we are unconditionally loved and inexpressibly understood, and yet we could search forever on earth and not really find that place. As St. Augustine wrote, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you”—one could add, “until it finds its home in you.”